1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a camera operating apparatus available for a surveillance system, and more particularly to a camera operating apparatus equipped with a joystick to operate at least one camera unit at an operation speed and at an operation direction which are to be changed by an operator.
2. Description of the Related Art
Up until now, there have been proposed a wide variety of conventional camera operating apparatuses each equipped with a joystick to operate at least one camera unit at an operation speed and at an operation direction which are to be changed by an operator.
The conventional camera operating apparatuses of this type have so far been used for such a surveillance system available for watching unqualified people and other intruders intruding into a special room which does not permit people with any permission from entering. One typical example of the conventional camera operating apparatuses is shown in FIG. 10 as being provided in combination with a prior-art surveillance system 700 which comprises a camera unit 710, a system unit 720 for controlling an operation speed and an operation direction to the camera unit 710, a display unit 730 for displaying an image taken by the camera unit 710, and the camera operating apparatus 740 for operating the camera unit 710 at the operation speed and at the operation direction which are to be changed by the operator in response to operation commands inputted therein. The system unit 720 is electrically connected to the camera unit 710, the display unit 730 and the camera operating apparatus 740 through signal transmitting lines 701, 702 and 703, respectively.
Description will now be made on how the image taken by the camera unit 710 is displayed on the screen of the display unit 730.
When the camera unit 710 is operated to take an image to be displayed on the screen of the display unit 730, the camera unit 710 is firstly driven by the camera operating apparatus 740 to transform the image into an image signal outputted to the signal transmitting line 701. The image signal thus outputted to the signal transmitting line 701 is then transmitted to a system unit 720 before being inputted to the display unit 730.
The image signal is then transformed into an image to be displayed on the screen of the display unit 730.
In order to have the camera unit 710 operated by the operation commands of the camera operating apparatus 740 to photograph an image, the camera operating apparatus 740 is operated to receive the operation commands respectively indicative of the photographing directions, magnifications and the like inputted by the operator while he or she is watching the screen of the display unit 730. The camera operating apparatus 740 inputted with the operation commands is then operated to transform the operation commands into a command signal to be transmitted to the signal transmitting line 703. The command signal thus transmitted to the signal transmitting line 703 is then inputted to the system unit 720 where the command signal is then transformed into a drive signal to drive the camera unit 710 to be outputted to the camera unit 710 by way of the signal transmitting line 701. The camera unit 710 thus received the drive signal from the system unit 720 is at this time operated to change the photographing directions, magnifications and the like into new ones.
As will be seen from the above, there has been described only one camera unit 710 provided in combination with the system unit 720, the display unit 730, the camera operating apparatus 740 in the conventional surveillance system 700 for the purpose of simplifying the description and assisting in understanding about the whole operation of the surveillance system.
In reality, such a conventional surveillance system 800, however, is as shown in FIG. 11 to comprise a plurality of camera units 810, a system unit 820, a plurality of display units 830, and a plurality of camera operating apparatuses 840. The conventional surveillance system 800 thus constructed allows the operator to selectively operate those camera operating apparatuses 840 to input to camera operating apparatuses 840 operation commands indicative of selecting one or more camera units 810 and one or more display units 830. This leads to the fact that the operator can select one or more camera operating apparatuses 840 not only to have the image displayed on the screen of one or more display units 830 in accordance with the image taken by one or more selected camera units 810 but to operate the camera units 810 under the operation states optioned by the operator.
Here, as the camera operating apparatus 840 forming part of the conventional surveillance system is used a CCTV (Closed Circuit Television) type of camera operating apparatus which is hereinafter referred simply to “a camera operating apparatus”. The camera operating apparatus used heretofore is generally equipped with a joystick designed to input operation commands by the operator to ensure that a camera unit is operated under various operation states changed in photographing directions, magnifications and the like. Such a joystick is usually pivotable at a variable inclination angle to input the operation command indicative of the inclination angle varied in response to the operation speed to the camera unit and at a variable inclination direction to input the operation command indicative of the inclination direction varied in response to the operation direction to the camera unit.
The conventional camera operating apparatus, however, encounters such a problem that the operation speed and the operation direction of the camera unit are changed in response to the inclination angle and the inclination direction of the joystick, resulting from the fact that it is difficult for the operator to minutely change the operation speed and the operation direction of the camera unit only by operating the joystick.